Help with gw 100 boiler

Ok, I know you are frustrated - I spent the whole winter that way last year - but you seriously need to see this through and NOT by throwing more money at this situation . . .

Your readings now apear to have TOO MUCH DRAUGHT, correct? Because that will piss away your wood.

I know that fully insturmented would be a great way to burn, but you still need some gut instinct. So . . . if the fire is up to temp and you add the white oak, what does the stack look like when the damper opens?

For my 'less than ideal' wood - assuming its cold out - you are going to get a reasonable large cloud of white 'smoke' (I think if you could analyze it, you would find a lot of water in it. After a full load and cold outside, the damper will remain open for 45-60 mins. When it closes you will now get somewheres between the aforementioned 'white cloud' and the coveted whisp of white. Now, when the damper opens the second time, you should get less than a minute of white cloud, then some thin blue for 1 min, then VSF. To me this means your water has been mostly baked out of the wood, and now you are back to burning efficiently.

The problems with the GW - in my experience - are

1)The refractory cracks to hell, and
2)It smokes out the load door

Item # 2 can be mitigated, and when placed outside, becomes a non-issue. Item #1 . . . the jury's still out on that.

If I were you, I would be wary of deeming 'wet wood' to be your problem. As someone else that runs a GW here said, you can burn wetter wood in these units. You will go through wood faster. You will produce more 'smoke'. But as Anthony mentioned, it's good to mix up your wood. One thing I have definitly found is that you want to burn all the way down to coals below the air inlets, then add a complete layer of dry wood on top of the coals, then alternate layers of wetter wood with dry wood. But lets face it . . . when its single digits or lower, stick with your better wood.

One thing I have found that sometimes helps with some wetter stuff you want to use . . . put it north/south on top of the pile. My idea is that it allows better air flow through the wet wood, removing the water quicker. Works for me.

OH!! Experiment for ya . . . . measure your draught, then remove a couple sections of that chimney you spent big bucks on . . . what does the draught measure then?

Jimbo

I remember reading in the Seton owners manual a big warning not to use a barometric draft damper . Imagine what would happen if you had a chimney fire an no way to kill the air supply . Fred recommends a good old fashioned stove pipe damper . Hope this info helps . Anthony

wow thats what gw recommends

I need some help again. Greenwood 190 with 10 degree drop
Finally got some good seasoned wood from my wood supplier built a pretty good fire few hrs. later temps went way up usually go to 205-210 have only went above 212 a few times is this safe.
today after building the fire temps went to 223 got worried and started dumping hot water from hot water tank.
also i some of the guys seem to have water storage to store hot water how does that work and can i do it with the gw 100
thanks doc .

Sounds like a out of control boiler , very bad news , totally fixable .
1 Do you hear a knocking sound in the boiler when the temperature rises past 200f ?
2 once the damper closes will the knocking stop and temp drops , relativity quickly ??
3 will your secondary high limit aquastat kick in and activate a dump zone ?
4 what is your primary high limit set for ?
5 Is their a possibility a small object is preventing the draft door from closing completely ?
6 When the draft door closes is it super tight an non movable ?

1 no i don't hear any knocking sound
2 damper is closing ok.
3 yes the secondary aquastat is working (was dumping heat last night)
4 190 with 10 degree drop ( i think anthony suggested this setting supposed to be a cleaner burn)
5 there is no object in the way of the damper ( something i have noticed the damper always stays open approx 1/4")
6 the damper closes tight an non movable.
my draft is a little on the strong side for a greenwood they suggest .5-.7 and mine when up to temp runs about .8-.9
i think i will put in a manual damper
thanks

Just had a brainstorm , if the GW has any air leaks you will have to compensate for them by lowering you aquastat settings . My Seton went through some very extensive custom air leak locating and sealing , which lets me push the boiler to the limits without over firing . Anthony

5 there is no object in the way of the damper ( something i have noticed the damper always stays open approx 1/4")
One more thought the damper should close 100% metal to metal . That 1/4'' gap can be the cause of allot of problems . Anthony

Ok, I am confused here . . . does the damper close? or doesn't it? Cause when you reach the high limit, the damper should close completely and not open again until the temp drops to the low set point. If your damper stays open, you are going to have a serious problem when the outside temp gets warm like today.

My GW damper door did not close tightly when I first got it. It took a couple weeks before I noticed 1/4" gap. That quarter inch cause quite a problem as the unit overheated twice. Overheating sucks. A quick adjustment of the damper motor mount solved the problem. The new GW have addressed this problem with a gasket, or so I'm told.
Good Luck, Pat

what did you do to close this 1/4" gap?
ok so it dosen't close tight there is always a 1/4" gap


I have another question when i purchased my unit i bought a sidearm for the hot water now that i read some literature it only assist with hot water production so you can't rely on the sidearm to produce all of your hot water. Is there a product that will produce all of the hot water needs? thanks in advance.

Yes, its called a WATER HEATER! - Smart-a$$ answers aside, a side arm might or might not give you as much DHW as you want, depending on the details of your setup, and your use patterns... Ultimately this is the case with ALL DHW producers. A side arm is typically setup to make a convection loop with your water heater and a circulator loop with the boiler / storage tank. As long as the sidearm input is getting heat, and you aren't pulling more out of the DHW tank than it can provide, you will be fine. If the sidearm isn't getting heat, it won't do anything to help... There are ways that others here can help with, to design your system to get the maximum benefit out of the sidearm, but there are limits. You may find that you need a backup heating system, or that some other form of dealing with heating your DHW is needed.

Gooserider

Goose nailed it. As long as your boiler is producing hot water, a sidearm will work very well. Typically, a sidearm is connected to a conventional water heater, and the hot water it produces will be stored in the water heater tank. So, a bigger tank will give you more DHW storage. Obviously, once your boiler goes out and you use up the hot water in the tank, you will either need a backup or you'll run out of DHW.

Mine is hooked up to a cheap electric water heater, which I switch off during the heating season.

Then all we need is a solar domestic hot water system to kick in once, the heating season over . That should leave us with plenty of time to restock the wood sheds and watch the fuel oil truck drive by .

1) When the damper is open, look at the stove side of the damper. You should see 4 well delineated dark circles that correspond to the air inlets. If these are not well defined, then the damper is not closing properly. Honestly, I would suggest you not operate the GW until you correct this.
2) What did you do about the draft? Did you try removing the last section of MetalBestos and remeasuring?

Item 1 above very easily explains your overheating on the GW. I am kind of curious what was happening at the other end where you were taking heat off. Did your inside boiler overheat?

Jimbo